One Decision Down

Well, I think we’re going to try it. I think Silje will be homeschooled next year. First, I feel the need to do my normal disclaimers. We don’t feel that this was in any way a reaction or statement of the public schools around us. Personally, we think the school she attended was great. It wasn’t a waste, and we are not ruling out public school in the future. Her teacher was first rate. I’m on the curriculum review board in town, and have seen what they study through the years and am not only impressed with the school, the school board, but our very innovative and thoughtful superintendent.

So why the switch? Well, mainly, I think we see more education there right now. A depth of education that logistically cannot be obtained through her school. It doesn’t take an analyst to realize that 1 on 1 teaching might be better than 1 on 25 teaching, or whatever the ratio is now.

We feel led to this right now. I feel like God is putting our kids in front of me and saying “This is your mission field right now.” Worst case scenario is that we hate it and go running back to the public school next year. However, the more we research it, the more excited we get. We spent so much time looking at different websites, and a little bummed that we didn’t start thinking about this during the last homeschool convention near us, where we could page through all of the different curriculums. We did a lot of research both online, and talked with several homeschool families, and those we would consider “homeschool experts.”

Still, we don’t feel as we are addressing this as a moral decision: as though one is Biblical and one is not. I think you could find Biblical grounds for sending your kids to public school as well as homeschooling.

To prepare you for this this lengthy and traditionally long-winded post, I’d like to write a bit about how our minds changed about some things with homeschooling. You see, I never ever saw myself as the homeschooling kinda mom. I’m not nearly fun enough for that. When my older kids were toddlers (really…not that long ago) I remember counting down until they could go to school! Get them out of the house so I can actually go on a bit with my life! I desired nothing more than just a little bit of peace and sanity in my house, and saw the availability of schools to meet that need.

The reality of how fast this time of childhood thing is going is really sinking in.

No one was surprised more by the change than me. Well, maybe Knut. You see, I don’t mean this to come out sounding awful, but I started liking being around my kids more. I mean, I love my kids, and I miss them when they’re gone, but really, I couldn’t wait to hand them off to a teacher.

The idea of Silje being home all day so we could do things together starting sounding more and more fun, and less like a chore. She’s so smart, and so funny, and did I say smart? It’s amazing how her mind works when we sit and talk about anything. Then there’s the struggle that she spends so much of her day at school, that we barely see her. If she were learning or playing or having fun during that time, that would be one thing, but she’s bored a lot.

If we can’t see her, how are we to disciple her? How are we supposed to train her, and coach her through the challenges she’s bound to face? Knut put it well, that we could still do public school, and have no problem. However, with our goals in mind, homeschooling might be easier for us. We think the idea of addressing problems as they come might be easier than waiting for her to come home, making supper, having supper, and having baths, and then maybe scheduling a time to talk to her about something right before bed she may not be interested in talking about anymore…well it sounds easier to just talk to her throughout the day when it’s appropriate.

Don’t get me wrong, I know it will be work. I think I’ll find out exactly how much pretty soon, too! I think we realized it might be more effective, and although time consuming, maybe easier work to be in charge of her schooling. Plus, the curriculums we chose just excite us so much, that I really think Knut and I will enjoy it as well!

So for those who are interested, here is what will be ordered for our classroom for the next school year. It’s probably a bit overboard, and if it is, we’ll just have to roll it into another year.

Sonlight “core 1” (this will cover literature, history, geography and Bible. Many families wrap this around 2 years, but we’ll see how long it will take us to get it done as Silje is a huge reader!)

Saxon Math (in close second was “Math U See” which we may try another year)

Shurley English

Apologia Science – astronomy

Rosetta Stone Mandarin Chinese (homeschool addition)

We are also planning on signing her up for the children’s choir at the center for the arts in town (which practices once a week I believe), and are debating whether or not it’s too much to have her be in piano lessons and/or ballet lessons this fall as well. Cost, of course, will play a role as well!

So want to hear details about what we picked? Feel free to leave now if you’re not! You’ve been warned! First, I’ll start with the core 1 from Sonlight. This was so different from other programs we saw in that it is completely literature based. There’s not a textbook or workbook in sight. The program comes with a box of amazing books. (I mean, my jaw dropped at some of the titles. From a literature perspective, I love their book list.) There are books both for Silje to read independently and for us to read aloud to the family, a teacher’s guide with too many activities to possibly do, a map, and a timeline, etc. From what we gather, we have daily readings, and then we discuss what we’ve read to insure comprehension, and then we mark all the places we read about on the map, mark all the dates we read about on the timeline, and do supporting activities. Core 1 covers creation to the fall of Rome. The Bible elective that comes with it has memory verses, which we will incorporate into our handwriting, and every memory verse is also set to music.

For the Sonlight, all the activities are ready to go, and require little to no preparation. All the lesson plans are laid out daily depending on how fast we plan on getting through it. We really loved their teaching philosophies as far as how we want to introduce our children to the world, rather than protecting them from the world. The worldview it teaches from is stellar. Not only that, it is taught in the old one-room schoolhouse style option, so that, let’s say David starts next year, we’ll just go onto core 2, and there will be activities for both Silje and David’s level, while using the same books. There are a few modifications that would have to be made, but from our understanding, that’s all laid out very well in the teacher’s handbook. I think this system works well when there is less than a 4 year gap between students.

Next on the list is Saxon math. This is different because it has workbooks for Silje to do, and then manipulatives to work with more hands on. There are weekly tests with this curriculum, (whereas “core 1” only has oral review) including things like drills and timed tests. The main deciding factor for choosing this was that this is the curriculum my sister taught at her super elite private school, and she highly recommended it to us. We drool over the school that she taught at, and her husband still teaches at down in Arizona. However, several homeschool families recommended “Math U See” and said it is very much preferred to Saxon math when you get into the upper grades. So we’ll keep that one in mind as well.

Shurley English is next. While I know some people use the Sonlight’s program for English, and still other families recommended Abeka for several subjects, one “homeschool expert” (aka Knut’s cousin;) ) told us to look into Shurley English. As an English major, all I have to say is WOW. Abeka was totally workbook, which was going to be my next choice, but I looked into Shurley English and again, WOW.

It does use a workbook, but the depth of things studied astounded me. You basically start off learning grammar and such by dissecting sentences, and labeling each word SN (subject/noun) verb, etc. Sounds dry, right? O no! Every grammar rule has a song to go to it. Can you tell I love the idea of learning through song? What a great way to embed something into your mind painlessly! So there are songs with actions, and workbooks with application, and of course, the daily lessons. I’m pretty excited about this one as well.

When it came to science, we got a lot of conflicting feelings from our pool of advisers. Not only that, not a whole lot of options were available for the 1st grade. Why? Because science isn’t a huge part of most school’s curriculum until 3rd grade. It gets entered here and there where it makes sense, but nothing formal. Several families said that they just studied nature together, gardened together, and checked out interesting books at the library.

We chose to go with an Apologia textbook on science because Knut especially (along with my Papa!) was horrified at the thought of doing science so laid back. The thought was there should be a plan, and it should be part of the routine. Apologia has amazing science textbooks, recommended by about everyone we talked to for all grades. For elementary school, it has 6 textbooks for 1st through 6th grade: one representing each day of creation. So we’ll start there. The first textbook starts with astronomy (God made the heavens and the earth.) There are 2-20 minute science activities to do with Silje (but most likely all the kids) a week. I’m guessing it will be things like studying the moon, constellations, etc. Apologia sounded in their philosophy to not be “preachy” as some Christian curriculums can be, but rather just grounded in solid science.

Lastly, we both felt very strongly, that if we were given the opportunity to homeschool, we would introduce a foreign language as early as possible. Why schools wait until high school to introduce a foreign language, I’ll never know. Language is most easily picked up and very young ages.

The question might be “why in the world Chinese?” Well, Spanish was a close second. There are a few reasons Chinese came out on top. First, Knut really wanted to learn it in college, but it wouldn’t fit in his schedule. Not only Silje, but Knut could work on it as well. I have an uncle living and working in China, and Knut has a cousin doing the same. Silje’s ability to Skype and speak to either of those would be within reach. We both feel that Chinese is the language to be learned in the future business world.

Not only that, it’s the language Silje wants to know most. She’s always had a fascination with China in general. She scours anything at the library on the country, and loves talking with people back from working there, and loves to talk with any Chinese people. She prays for China often. If there were one language she would be obsessed with, it would be Chinese.

Rosetta stone has the best program hands down. Really, nothing else came close. This class will be done completely on the computer. We’ll pop in her lesson for the day, and she’ll sit there with her headset and microphone, and do her lesson. At the end of the lesson, we’ll get a report as to how she did so that we can track her progress.

It’s done on the computer, but it’s not done online. There’s no instructor she’s working with. We’re planning on setting aside our old computer in the office that is not connected to the internet, and have that be the “school computer.”

As far as David goes, I’m not planning anything so formal, but there are some plans. He misses the cutoff for public kindergarten this fall, and I would agree, he’s not ready for that yet. Still, I think with Silje doing school at home, he’ll want something to do as well. He’s in the process of teaching himself how to read just as Silje did. He already reads most traffic signs, in church tries to sound out words in the bulletin, and he loves learning every word on a cereal box. I think I’ll do the basic “hooked on phonics” (I only have the first part I got at a consignment store.) with him just to get him started.

Also, he hates writing, and needs the most work there. My goal for the year is to get him to write his name well. I’m planning on getting hims some “Kumon” workbooks that Silje liked so much for learning to write letters, and maybe some fun dot to dot sheets to help him handle a pencil a bit better. We’re thinking he might be a lefty, although he uses both hands very well, so I’m a little apprehensive as to how to teach him writing. Then of course, he’ll be apart of the read aloud books in Silje’s core 1, and he’ll love being a part of the science projects as well, I’m sure.

As for Elias, our goal for the year is to get him talking! We may regret that, but I think it might be a necessity!